back to article Brit moron tried buying a car bomb on dark web, posted it to his address. Now he's screwed

A British teenager who tried to order a car bomb on the dark web and get it delivered to his address has been found guilty this week. Gurtej Randhawa Failure ... Gurtej Randhawa (Source: NCA) Gurtej Randhawa, 19, of Wightwick, in the West Midlands of England, was cuffed by cops in May after purchasing what he thought was …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    And if this sudden jihadist had not been so stupid? How many dead?

    The real story here is about teenagers who grow up wanting to murder infidels for their religion.

    "He was not involved in an organised crime group or linked to terrorism..."

    Um, car bomb? Yet, no "link to terrorism"? Yeah, sure.

    1. AdamWill

      er...

      ...why are you assuming he's a 'jihadist' exactly? If I were gonna make any cases, based on the name and mugshot, I'd guess he was a Sikh.

      And no, wanting a car bomb doesn't make you a terrorist. Terrorism is violence with a political objective. Thus the Las Vegas shooting, for instance, wasn't terrorism. Plenty of people have been blown up with car bombs for non-political reasons.

      1. macjules

        Re: er...

        The Mattese Government Mafia use carbombs, yet nobody accuses them of terrorism.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: er...

          The Maltese Government Mafia use carbombs, yet nobody accuses them of terrorism.

          No, but politically the country is in such a mess that even the corrupt people are fed up, and whoever did this has pretty much put a fuse to a powder keg.

          That said, WTF? Selling car bomb assemblies online? Sure, grab the buyers asap but I certainly would want to have the proven sellers moved to narrower confines as well, preferably with one of their products, counting down from a week. "I didn't know the buyer was going to blow things up" is a rather hard sell to any sane judge IMHO.

          1. Alistair

            Re: er...

            @AC

            "Selling car bomb assemblies online? Sure, grab the buyers asap"

            The implication in the article is that the seller was a cop. Posting to a dark web sales portal.

            There are of course *other* implications there but I'll bet fairly long odds that this was in the category of that group of LEA that are tasked with "Get some idiot to do something stupid online, and find out where they live". Like the herd of '13 year old teenage girls'.

        2. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

          Re: er...

          The Mafia use carbombs, yet nobody accuses them of terrorism.\

          Not twice anyway

      2. Solarflare

        Re: er...

        "why are you assuming he's a 'jihadist' exactly?"

        He's assuming that because the guy is brown. Whether John will admit that or not is another matter...

        1. Scott Broukell

          Judging a book by it's cover

          "He's assuming that because the guy is brown" And therein lies the problem, because if you were to open up any of us humans, be it with a machete, an IED or on the surgeons table, you will find that we are ALL exactly the same colour on the inside. Yet the wrapper is what gets our attention and not the shared contents. Quite when humanity, as a whole, will be able to get over this apparently built-in bias towards some really quite subtle external differences is increasingly difficult to tell, but I feel sure that the primitive tribalism and deluded religious belief systems which we continue to exhibit will keep us all held back from progress for some time to come.

          1. Stoneshop
            Boffin

            Re: Judging a book by it's cover

            because if you were to open up any of us humans, be it with a machete, an IED or on the surgeons table, you will find that we are ALL exactly the same colour on the inside.

            At least, after correcting for the number of cigarettes smoked during their lifetime.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Judging a book by it's cover

            Quite when humanity, as a whole, will be able to get over this apparently built-in bias towards some really quite subtle external differences is increasingly difficult to tell...

            I think we never will, although we should certainly try hard to.

            I suspect this bias is deliberately hard-wired into all of us so we can very quickly make a decision about who is in our tribe/pack vs. who is not, and therefore might be a competing or dangerous threat. Dogs and other pack animals behave in just the same way. The BIOS in our wet-ware stack has not been updated for a very, very long time. As a species we will react very badly indeed when we meet our first ET en masse.

          3. Aodhhan

            Re: Judging a book by it's cover

            We're all the same on the inside... this is a parochial method of thinking. I take it you're an adult now, and can stop repeating things you were taught when you were 8.

            The problem is, the lungs, liver, [insert any organ] may be 'roughly' the same; however, how the brain is programmed and processes isn't the same. It's the brain, not any other organ which dictates your actions.

            If you're poor and you grow up in crappy conditions, you're going to see life a lot different than someone who didn't want for anything. You're also going to have very different life experiences.

            We don't need white people to 'help us', defend or pander to us. We definitely don't want white people going out of their way to show us they aren't racist. It's not shocking to us, when we invite these white individuals to come to our house to have an evening meal... they'll do everything to change the subject or wiggle out.

            You want to lash out against racism then lash out at racism/prejudice, but do it without describing color, religion, jihad, etc. Stop pandering and whining, and start living and accepting ALL people the SAME.

            If this kid was white, there wouldn't be any mention of race, religion, conspiracy, etc.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Judging a book by it's cover

              We don't need white people to 'help us', defend or pander to us. We definitely don't want white people going out of their way to show us they aren't racist. It's not shocking to us, when we invite these white individuals to come to our house to have an evening meal... they'll do everything to change the subject or wiggle out.

              You want to lash out against racism then lash out at racism/prejudice, but do it without describing color, religion, jihad, etc. Stop pandering and whining, and start living and accepting ALL people the SAME.

              I would like to add a flipside to that, though - stop explaining everything you don't like as racism. I grew up with people of all colour and race, and to me, skin colour has about the same significance as hair colour. We used to poke fun at each other about either colour in the same fashion, and that was OK because we accepted that was simply a physical difference that had no local or collective impact on the person underneath. I accept that other people with my skin colour have been racist and abusive, but recognise that that doesn't make *all* white people racists.

              It may help if you translate that "pandering" as people actually caring, and being upset that others not only are racists but actively encourage each other to perpetuate that miscategorisation of fellow human beings. If there is something you don't like, gently correct them but remember that they're on "your" side, with "your" meaning "our - all of us".

              Apologies if this is a bit of a ramble but I wanted to do this unedited.

              BTW: in fact, few white people exist. Generally they're pink-ish :).

              BTW2: if being of colour is so bad, do racists avoid getting a tan?

          4. Kane

            Re: Judging a book by it's cover

            "...because if you were to open up any of us humans, be it with a machete, an IED or on the surgeons table, you will find that we are ALL exactly the same colour on the inside."

            Reminds me of a Clive Barker quote: "Every body is a book of blood; Wherever we're opened, we're red."

        2. bombastic bob Silver badge
          Thumb Down

          Re: er...

          "He's assuming that because the guy is brown."

          it ALSO takes a racist to make a statement like that... because SJW's who focus on race are, in fact, RACIST for doing so.

      3. Lysenko

        Re: er...

        If I were gonna make any cases, based on the name and mugshot, I'd guess he was a Sikh

        All the name tells you is that he has Pubjabi heritage (Jat, specifically) and most Punjabis are Pakistani (~70%) and therefore Muslim (~98%).

        1. Martin Taylor 1

          Re: er...

          "All the name tells you is that he has Pubjabi heritage (Jat, specifically) and most Punjabis are Pakistani (~70%) and therefore Muslim (~98%)."

          But I would expect a Muslim to have a Muslim name. The top-knot also suggests a wearer of a Sikh turban.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: er...

            European media has been known to leave the - as you put it - "muslim" bits out.

            Wasn't it in Sweden where they even lightened skin tones in published photos?

            Let's all hold hands and say all we want for Christmas the general holiday season is world peace an alt+Left one world government?

          2. ToddRundgrensUtopia

            Re: er...

            I may be wrong, but I thought all Singhs are Sihks. I however missed "Singh" in the Registers article, I did see it in other journals. I also do not see a "top knot" in this article which again to me would say Sikh.

          3. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

            Re: er...

            The top-knot also suggests a wearer of a Sikh turban.

            Also, pre-partition, lots of Sikhs lived in the Punjab. Post-partition, lots of them were dead and the rest fled to India.

            Same happened in reverse in the parts of the Punjab that remained Indian - the Moslems were mostly dead or fled to Pakistan.

            A pretty terrible situation for all involved.

            So - having a Punjabi name certainly doesn't preclude him being Sikh.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: er...

          "All the name tells you is that he has Pubjabi heritage (Jat, specifically) and most Punjabis are Pakistani (~70%) and therefore Muslim (~98%)."

          Wrong. Punjabi heritage yes, but after 1947, part of Punjab ended up in Pakistan and the rest in India. Guess which side the Muslims ended up in?

          And Randhawa is a typically Sikh surname not Muslim.

        3. isr

          Re: er...

          (This is the same level of intelligence as those dimwits who used to go around beating up Sikhs in 'Murica because they wear turbans, so they must be related to Bin Laden. Except in this case, tragicomically - its in reverse.)

          Lovely how people think a few google searches suddenly makes them an authoritative expert. NOT.

          (copious use of uppercase below means exactly what it implies)

          Yes, the larger part of Punjab is now in Pakistan. And that is predominantly Muslim.

          However, as someone OF Pakistani (and Punjabi) heritage, I can (and, well, WILL) tell you, categorically, that his name DOES show that he is NOT a Muslim.

          Consequently, without any further research, you can deduce (with a likely success rate in the high 99% range) that he is also not of Pakistani-Punjabi origin.

          If you had done a little better job with your googling (basically, just see the bbc article about this which gives his FULL name, with 'Singh'), then you can up the probablity that he is not Pakistani nor Muslim to 99.99999999%

          In which case, we can now state with greater confidence that you are a visitor from Alpha Centauri Prime, than we can state that he is a Pakistani-Muslim.

          1. James O'Shea

            Re: er...

            "If you had done a little better job with your googling (basically, just see the bbc article about this which gives his FULL name, with 'Singh'), then you can up the probablity that he is not Pakistani nor Muslim to 99.99999999%"

            Ooh, yeah... someone with 'Singh' in their name and from anywhere _near_ the Punjab is going to be Sikh (95+% probability) or Hindu (what's left) not Muslim. Not unless he converted and kept the name, anyway, something quite unlikely. All (male) Sikhs have 'Singh' somewhere about (girls have 'Kaur') but not all Singhs are Sikhs.

      4. Timmy B

        Re: er...

        RE: "why are you assuming he's a 'jihadist' exactly?"

        Because on balance of probability, being that the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam, then it's most likely that's the case here.

        1. sabroni Silver badge

          Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

          Or you could say the vast majority of terrorists incidents world wide are linked to western imperialism. Learn a bit of history, as usual the situation is far more complex than "islam = bad, capitalism = good".

          No, I'm not excusing terrorism, I'm also not giving Western governments a free pass.

          1. Timmy B

            Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

            "Or you could say the vast majority of terrorists incidents world wide are linked to western imperialism. "

            The majority of Islamic terrorist actions worldwide are not against western countries. That kind of makes your point silly.

            How many western countries currently have the death penalty for apostasy or homosexuality or adultery? The issue here isn't big bad imperialists. It is a incompatible difference between Islam and western ideals.

            1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

              Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

              How many western countries currently have the death penalty for apostasy or homosexuality or adultery?

              Unless those countries you are thinking of are specifically theocracies, they will have a separation of state and religion, and thus their laws are a cultural, not a religious artefact. Don't conflate what are societal norms in a culture with religion. Very few countries have the death penalty for apostasy (although there is no excuse for those that do), and several sub-saharan african countries that are nominally Christian have the death penalty for homosexuality or adultery.

              The fact is that Islam encompasses a vast number of people from different cultural backgrounds, and you are insinuating that they all behave like the lowest common denominator. It's the exact same faulty thinking that equates all Christians with racist bible-belt gun nuts.

              1. Sir Runcible Spoon
                WTF?

                Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

                In addition to innate racial discrimination (which civilized beings try to overcome with rational thoughts) there is a very disturbing set of people who seem to find it acceptable to make disabled peoples' lives even more miserable than it probably already is.

                I mean, really, what could someone with one leg, or down syndrome, possibly have done to someone that was so bad that hundreds of arseholes think it's ok to ridicule them, even attack them?

                Are peoples' lives so empty and devoid of compassion that they can't tell when they are actually quite well off (historically speaking) and feel like bashing on someone totally worse off than they are?

                Seriously, I don't get it.

                1. Kiwi
                  Pint

                  Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

                  Seriously, I don't get it.

            2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

              Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

              How many western countries currently have the death penalty for apostasy or homosexuality or adultery?

              You would be surprised by how many people in western countries would like to introduce these. I suggest a re-educational visit to Utah or rural Poland to expand your cultural horizons.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

                @ Voland's right hand

                " .. rural Poland .. "

                That's just it, you'd have to go to some obscure part of a obscure state or province to find them .. Western nations aren't exactly going head over heals to institute such things. hello

                1. Kiwi
                  Black Helicopters

                  Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

                  Western nations aren't exactly going head over heals to institute such things. hello

                  Look closer. "Head over heels"? No. "How can we make the public want this?" - that's another matter.

              2. Timmy B

                Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

                To voland

                "You would be surprised by how many people in western countries would like to introduce these."

                Not many as people in these places tend to vote in their laws and none of them have voted these in. But religious dictatorships are another thing....

            3. Mike Moyle

              Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

              "How many western countries currently have the death penalty for apostasy or homosexuality or adultery?"

              The Dominionists leading the ever-rightward push in the Republican party are salivating at the possibility of doing exactly that in the U.S.. If the Democrats can't get their act together, expect it in about ten years.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam

            ok but can we at least agree:

            99.99999% muslim people = good

            many ideas in islam = bad

            Criticising ideas (not people) should not be equated with racism/bigotry plus some simple facts about the link between islamism and terrorism need to be accepted:

            https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DIAb5tkU0AAyKyA.jpg

        2. Peter2 Silver badge

          Re: er...

          "RE: "why are you assuming he's a 'jihadist' exactly?""

          I think the assumption goes something along the lines of

          1) He was in poesssion of a (fake) car bomb.

          2) This has no other purporse than blowing up a car and killing people nearby with shrapnel.

          3) That's usually connected with terrorism.

          4) The substantive majority of people slaughtering random crowds at the moment are jihadists. (replacing the IRA, and wide variety of terrorist groups funded by the soviet union during the cold war in revenge for us bankrolling and supplying the taliban and causing the soviet union to have to quit afghanistan)

          1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: er...

            "3) That's usually connected with terrorism."

            Read what you wrote again. See that word "usually"? It's a dangerous word to use if you're not into rigorous thinking. It can lead you seriously off-track.

            1. nijam Silver badge

              Re: er...

              > It's a dangerous word to use if you're not into rigorous thinking

              Well, I'd say it's a dangerous word to omit if you're not into rigorous thinking.

            2. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: er...

              "3) That's usually connected with terrorism."

              Not really.

              Car bombs are mostly targeted mob and political assassination devices. They are used to remove a particular offending Maltese, Ukrainian or Italian journo, a Sicilian prosecutor who is refusing to take the handsome offer given to him, etc. While in some cases it may qualify under the definition of terrorism in most cases it is jut plain old mob settling scores.

              (*)The guy is most likely a Sikh by the way (I am 95% confident as I was unfortunate to have a Sikh with the same family name as a boss and he mentioned he had relatives in that neighbourhood). So that mostly removes the more common terrorist motives for the "UK market" at present.

          2. Alistair
            Windows

            Re: er...

            @ Peter2

            The taliban

            Osama bin Laden

            The Muslim Brotherhood

            ISIS (no concrete proof on that one yet, but y'know, regime change and all)

            Jamaliat based variants throughout asia .....

            And that's just the muslim radicals that the "western" governments have spent money, arms, training on in the last 50 years. We could go on and on -- there's reason to look at all of Chechnya and several of the 'stans something about oil and other interesting minerals that seem to have gone missing over the years... It really is a simple fact, the CIA is either utterly stupid or completely insane.

            1. Sir Runcible Spoon
              Coat

              Re: er...

              "It really is a simple fact, the CIA is either utterly stupid or completely insane."

              That doesn't look like an xor function to me.

              1. Alistair
                Windows

                Re: er...

                @SirRS

                ---- I'll concede that I could have used better syntax there.....

          3. Joe Montana

            Re: er...

            Actually the primary purpose of a car bomb is usually to blow up the car and kill the occupants, trying to kill or injure nearby pedestrians with shrapnel would usually be achieved by filling the entire car with something explosive or flammable. A car bomb is usually small and concealed so the driver of the car doesn't notice its presence until it detonates.

            That said there is also a small chance that this guy was driven by curiosity rather than nefarious purposes, perhaps he wanted to buy an old car and blow it up in a field somewhere to make a youtube video? People are *supposed* to be innocent until proven guilty and destroying your own property is not a crime.

          4. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

            Re: er...

            I'm assuming the 4 pages of comments are all in one chain due the the el reg system , so this one will appear 4 pages and 50 subjects later than the one I'm replying to, so i wont bother.

            Its interesting looking at the patterns of up and down votes to the comments on this discussion though.

        3. aphexbr

          Re: er...

          "the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam"

          Only because when white people commit terrorist actions, they're "lone wolves", "have mental issues", etc. Anything to not call them terrorists when they blow people up or kill scores of innocent people. Shooting up churches in the name of creating a race war isn't terrorism because Dylann Roof was white, don't ya know, and Brevik wasn't really a terrorist for reasons. But, if a guy's brown it's a terrorist action no matter the actual intention.

          You know, because admitting that there's lots of other terrorists and that the vast majority of Muslims do no such thing gets in the way of excuses to drop bombs on their countries and stealing their resources. Except the Sauds, of course, they're the good ones despite being behind lots of the actual terrorism directly.

          1. ToddRundgrensUtopia

            Re: er...

            Most acts of terrorism are committed by muslims. i.e. they believe that there is only one true religion and way of life and all should follow it or should not exist. Roman catholics used to do the same thing, so give Islam another 50 years, (hopefully we wont need 700 years), and they might grow up and realise religions are fairly silly things to follow.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: er...

              Most acts of terrorism are committed by muslims. i.e. they believe that there is only one true religion and way of life and all should follow it or should not exist

              I'm not entirely sure the IRA & associated outfits have entirely stopped.

            2. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

              Re: er...

              Most acts of terrorism are committed by muslims

              I would suggest that you don't approach a member of the RealIRA and suggest that he might be a Muslim..

              1. James O'Shea

                Re: er...

                "Most acts of terrorism are committed by muslims

                I would suggest that you don't approach a member of the RealIRA and suggest that he might be a Muslim.."

                Oh, I'd suggest that he do just that. Just so long as he let me know beforehand, so that I could watch from a nice safe distance. And, if possible, he should let me have enough time to get some popcorn.

        4. James O'Shea

          Re: er...

          "Because on balance of probability, being that the vast majority of terrorist incidents world wide are linked to Islam, then it's most likely that's the case here."

          Damn boy, you mean that the ee-vul bacon-haters have gone and taken another job from us hard-working, exceedingly Catholic, Irishmen? Time for a new crusade! Deus Vult! (No, not deus vulture, you prod gits.)

        5. isr

          Re: er...

          So despite the facts that:

          - he's not a Muslim

          - he's not from a Muslim country

          the "probabilities" still check out for you?

          And, if you're from Murica, then the fact that most of the biggest terrorist incidents in the last decade have all been carried out by white Christian men wih guns, you're still equating terrorism with Muslims solely?

          Hmm ...

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